A Tale of Two Wands
by Sue Snell
Summary: Like most Hogwarts students, Stan and Ford get their start at Ollivander's, but they can't begin to imagine what's to come... (Stands alone, but same universe as Where the Brave Ones Go.)
1. Primus Praecantatio

"Alright boys," said Hagrid, "Last stop, Ollivander's."

Stan and Ford trailed along in the giant's wake as he easily pushed through the crowded thoroughfare of Diagon Alley. Both of them were excited and tired and nervous and happy, all at the same time.

Hagrid was the groundskeeper at Hogwarts, and he'd been sent by Dumbledore to take them to get all the things they'd need for school. He was really tall and scary-looking, but also really nice. With his help they'd already picked up their robes, books, and potion supplies, so all there was left to get now was their wands. He led the way to the tiny wand shop.

"Most everyone what goes to Hogwarts gets their wand at Ollivander's," he told them, "Most every famous witch or wizard ye ever heard of, at that. You'll be in good company, gettin' yer start at Ollivander's."

"But how will we know which wands to pick?" Ford asked.

"Don't you worry 'bout that," said Hagrid, "Mister Ollivander knows how to find the right wand fer ye. Been in the business fer centuries, the Ollivanders have. Besides, when ye get right down to it, _you_ won't really be the ones doin' the pickin.'"

"We won't?" said Ford.

"'The wand chooses the wizard.' That's what everyone in the business says. When ye pick up the right wand for you and give it a wave, it'll know. And it'll let you know too."

"Wow…" Ford whispered.

Hagrid smiled and opened the door of the shop, ushering Stan and Ford inside.

The interior of the store was gloomy in comparison to the bright sunny day outside, and they all had to blink their eyes to adjust to it. The dim room was small and sparse: Just a spindly little chair—which Hagrid sat on—a counter with a cash register and some papers, and the boxes. The _boxes_. The place was _stuffed_ with stacks, the very walls obscured by skinny boxes, packed tight together like bricks. There had to be thousands of them.

"Good afternoon," came a quiet voice. All three of them jumped—Hagrid nearly falling out of the chair—and whirled around to see the man—Mister Ollivander?—who seemed to have appeared from thin air.

He had silver hair and a thin face and was one of those grown-ups who looked like he could be anywhere from forty to four hundred, like he'd been born an old man. His eyes were the same silver as his hair and almost seemed to glow in the gloom.

"Stanley and Stanford Pines," he said, nodding at them each in turn. Ford wondered how he already knew which one was which, then got a sudden urge to stuff his hands in his pockets. "I've been expecting you today." He looked to Hagrid with a polite nod. "Rubeus."

Hagrid smiled nervously and nodded back, fidgeting with his pink umbrella. He'd been carrying it around all day, even though there wasn't a cloud in the sky.

Apparently that was all Ollivander had to say to Hagrid, because he immediately turned back to Stan and Ford.

"Let's begin, shall we?" he said, "Let me see your wand arms."

"That'd be the hand ye write with," Hagrid added helpfully.

Stan held out his right arm and, after thinking about it a second, Ford held out his right arm too. Ollivander got out a silver measuring tape and took lengths for both their arms, then checked from wrist to elbow on them, then palm-width, and then he let go of the measuring tape and went to go straighten up some paperwork lying on the counter, but the measuring tape kept on going, all by itself: It measured the distance between Ford's shoulder blades, then the circumference of Stan's forearm, then the length of Ford's _nose_. At that point he had to ask: "Are all these measurements really, um, necessary, Mister Ollivander?"

"Yeah," said Stan, ducking out from under the measuring tape as it tried to wrap around his head, "I mean, if 'the wand chooses the wizard' anyway, then we should just be able to try 'em until we find the ones that work, right?"

Without waiting for a response from Ollivander, Stan scampered over to the nearest stack of boxes and yanked one out at eye-level, miraculously leaving a space behind instead of toppling the entire pile.

"I wouldn't recommend that one," said Ollivander sternly as Stan opened the box.

"Why not?"

"Aspen, unicorn hair, fourteen inches. Fancy yourself a duelist, do you?"

"Guess not…" said Stan with a shrug. He pulled the wand out of the box and waved it around anyway. Nothing happened.

"Now if you'll come back over here, we can—"

But instead of minding Ollivander and coming back to be measured with Ford, Stan snatched another box from the stack.

"Stan!" Ford protested as the measuring tape wrapped around his wrist and got lengths for all six fingers, "You're not supposed to—"

"How about this one?"

"Rosewood, ten inches, phoenix feather," said Ollivander mechanically, "For you? Not likely."

Indeed, this wand failed to respond to Stan's flourishes too, even as they grew insistent, as if he expected to shake some magic out of the stick through pure brute force.

"Here, you try." Stan tossed the wand to Ford, who barely caught it.

"We're not supposed to…" Ford mumbled, staring at the stick in his hand. He looked up to Ollivander, who gave him a tired but encouraging smile. Looking back to the wand in his hand, he gave it a shake. That felt stupid. The wand didn't do anything more for him than it did for Stan. Face hot, he walked over and picked up the wand's box from where Stan had dropped it on the floor, then tucked the wand back inside it. He even spotted the blank spot in the stack where the box belonged and carefully slid it back in.

Stan, meanwhile, was pulling out more boxes. Some he peeked in and abandoned immediately, others he got out and played with to no effect. Ford followed behind him, mostly cleaning up his mess, but also surreptitiously trying out some of the wands himself. Ollivander had given up trying to corral them and simply stood back near the door with his arms crossed, one eyebrow cocked as if he _dared_ them to find their wands without his help. Considering the number of boxes in the shop, Ford didn't like their chances.

Stan grabbed yet another box, tossed the lid away, and gave a surprised laugh when he looked inside.

"Hey, there's _two_ wands in this one, Mister Ollivander!"

"I know," the man replied dryly.

"So what kind are these?" Stan asked. He grabbed one of the wands and then passed the box to Ford.

"Eight and a half inches each, cypress and pine." Ollivander pointed at the one in Stan's hand and the one Ford carefully took from the box respectively. "Cores of dragon heartstring."

"Hey, look!" Stan cried, whipping his wand in a circle above his head like a cowboy with a lasso. From the tip of the wand flowed a fluttering stream of bright orange flame, trailing through the air like a ribbon on a baton. Giggling with delight, he asked, "You think it likes me, Mister Ollivander?" Before the man could answer, the boy hollered, "Try yours, Ford! This is _so_ cool!"

"Um, okay…" Ford gave his wand a tentative flick, and out came a great big shower of orange sparks, like it was the Fourth of July and he'd lit the mother of all sparklers. He laughed and flicked out another volley, then another, and all the while Stan kept carving patterns of light into the air around them. Between the two of them the shop was soon bathed in orange light, a sunset glow at three in the afternoon.

After a moment, Ollivander cleared his throat.

"It would seem you've stumbled upon your matches, Mister Pines," he said.

"Ya _think?_ " said Stan.

Ford took the hint and stopped playing with his wand. He started to put it back in the box, but that felt like the wrong thing to do, a silly thing to do, like taking off his glasses and tucking them away in someone else's nightstand. He held onto the wand instead.

"Stanley…" he said after a few more seconds of his brother continuing to wave his about like he was conducting an orchestra.

Stan smiled bashfully and finally stopped playing around.

"Right," he said, "Uh…" He glanced over at where Hagrid sat, idly fiddling with his umbrella.

"Oh! Right." The giant stood up quickly, toppling the spindly chair, and started hunting through his coat's countless pockets. Dumbledore's money—Or was it Hogwarts's money?—was paying for all their essential magic school supplies. While Hagrid tracked down his coin pouch, Ford asked, "How come these two were in the same box, Mister Ollivander?"

"Because of their cores," the man replied, "You see, normally I only construct one wand from one dragon's heartstring. There are those who would argue that's a waste of material, but a true craftsman knows it helps ensure each wand's individuality. As I was preparing the core for this one, however—" He nodded at Ford's wand. "—the heartstring split—straight down the middle—leaving two perfect halves, _most_ remarkable. Even so, I considered disposing of one half so the other would remain unique. But, you must understand…"

Something flashed at the edge of Ford's vision and he glanced over to see Stan fiddling listlessly with his wand, already bored with Ollivander's story and no-doubt anxious to start trying out magic now he had a wand.

"…the dragon that gave that heartstring was one of the oldest Ironbellies that ever lived. A great and fearsome beauty. It would have been a sin to waste her gift, so I made two wands instead."

"Wait," said Ford, "Does that mean…" He smiled shyly. "These wands are _twins?_ "

"Precisely."

"Whoa…" said Stan.

"Cool!" said Ford.

Ollivander offered to wrap the box for them, but both Stan and Ford were reluctant to part with their new wands, and, chuckling, Hagrid told them they could hold onto them so long as they didn't try to cast any spells.

"At least," he added in a whisper while Ollivander's back was turned, "Not where no one can see ye." He winked.

He paid Ollivander for the wands, and, before they left, Ford made sure to say, "Thank you, Mister Ollivander."

"Yeah!" said Stan, "Thanks for the wands, Mister Ollivander!"

Ollivander nodded solemnly.

"Take good care of them, boys," he said, "I've never made a pair of wands quite like those before, and I doubt I will again."


	2. Lumos

Another day, another endless hour of Charms.

It was kind of funny. Charms had been one of Stan's favorite classes back in his first year, when everything felt new and super important. Four years later, though, the _charm_ had worn off. (Would Ford laugh at that? Nah, probably just roll his eyes.) Now it was one of those classes where he struggled to stay awake. This wouldn't be as much of a problem if he didn't have to sit in the front row.

Okay, he didn't _have_ to sit in the front row, but the Charms classroom was all two-person desks, and _Ford_ always got dibs on one at the front, and it wasn't like there was anyone else Stan wanted to get stuck sharing a desk with, even if it meant sitting at point-blank death-glare range from Professor Glass.

Glass was a thin, elderly, bespectacled man with a shiny bald head. What hair he had sat in a fluffy ring around his head; from the back it looked like a walnut in a white tutu. Sometimes he got mean when he got the impression his students weren't listening to his lectures, and his lectures… They weren't _boring_ , per se, but… _long_. Wordy. This was the class where they were supposed to be doing new spells; no one wanted a big long speech running over the part where you get to do actual _magic_.

What made today even worse than normal was Glass had started off the class by saying today's lesson would be "more hands-on" than usual. Stan had dared to hope that meant they'd get more practice time than usual, but then Glass had just launched into an endless lecture about wandlore. Were there even gonna be any new spells today? Stan half-listened to the lecture, hoping to catch something that sounded like a conclusion. At least there were occasional unintentionally funny comments about "wand-handling" to keep him amused.

"Now," Glass was saying, "Everyone knows that most wands are reluctant to perform in the hands of an unfamiliar wizard. However— _what_ is so funny, if I may ask, Mister Pines?"

"Nothing, sir." Stan bit his lip to keep himself from snorting again.

"I certainly hope so, if Slytherin is to end this class period with as many points as it began with. Now, as I was saying: There will come times in most of your lives when you will have to use a wand which is not your own. Wands can break, get lost, fall victim to children and pets, and suffer a wide variety of nasty backfires in the midst of a dangerous spell—or the hands of a sloppy caster. Therefore, it is imperative you each learn to cast competently with someone else's wand. Now, I want each of you to trade wands with your deskmate."

Stan yawned and rolled his wand over to Ford's side of the desk. Ford passed his own to Stan, then picked up his brother's wand gingerly, eyeing it like he thought it might spontaneously combust.

"Everyone traded? Good. Now let's start with something simple: Everyone try _lumos_."

" _Lumos!_ " the room chorused. A handful of wands lit up as expected—Stan's and Ford's among them—but others flickered like bad lightbulbs and still others shone a light so dull you could barely tell it was there. The classroom filled with giggles, incredulous scoffs, and muttered swearing as the students whose spells failed tried to recover from the mishap. Several seconds later most of the room had achieved a passable _lumos_ , but the collective light was still way dimmer than it should've been, and a few students still struggled to get the flickering to stop.

"See?" said Glass, "Not as easy as you thought, was it? And in real life you'll need to perform far more complex casting than that. Now everyone get your quills out and try _wingardium leviosa_."

" _Wingardium leviosa!_ " This time the room's collective voice was more hesitant, the class at large no longer as confident as it'd been with _lumos_. Many of the feathers stayed down, but an unfortunate handful rocketed around the room erratically, like kites caught in a sudden gale. As some students chased after their quills while others desperately tried to get theirs to lift even an inch off their desks, a lucky few successfully cast the spell and had their quills floating in the air. Again, both Stan and Ford were among the lucky few.

"Once you get it into the air, see if you can direct it," Glass instructed. Within seconds the number of rogue quills shooting around doubled. With a quiet chuckle, the professor began walking around the room, congratulating those who managed to keep their quills close by and offering assistance to those less fortunate. When he made it to Stan and Ford's area, he had nothing but praise:

"Good show, McGucket, very nice. _Very_ good, Stanford, _most_ impressive and—I say! Stanley! Well done!"

"It's really not that difficult, professor," said Ford with affected modesty.

"Yeah, it's pretty easy," said Stan. With a sideways glance at Ford, he said, "Hey, you think it's because our wands are 'twins'?"

"Twins?" the professor repeated, tilting his head.

"Their cores, sir," said Ford, looking embarrassed now, "They came from the same dragon's heartstring."

"Fascinating…" Glass murmured. Eyes narrowing, he added, "And possibly an unfair advantage, yes. Let's see what happens when you two trade with the desk behind you, shall we?"

Before they could do anything, Glass's head snapped up and he barked, "Higgs! Just what do you think you're doing?" He muttered a quick, "Go on, I'll be back in a minute." Then he was off on the other side of the room dealing with a student who, for reasons unknown, was wielding two wands at once.

Stan and Ford both sighed, turned around, and reluctantly traded with the desk behind them—McGucket and Penelope, a Ravenclaw girl who'd been sitting by McGucket a lot lately.

"Yours is so short, Pines," she remarked as she handed McGucket's wand off to Ford. A split second later her hand flew to her mouth and her face turned pink.

"Hey now," said Stan, passing Ford's wand to McGucket, "It ain't the size that counts, right?" He waggled his eyebrows at her and she snorted and went a brighter shade of red.

"Say," said McGucket, already maneuvering his quill through the air with Ford's wand, "Yours don't handle half bad, Ford. I think I could actually have fun with this one—no offense, Pen."

"Well now you're just makin' it weird, McGucket," said Stan, eyes still on Penelope, whose giggling now verged on hysterics.

Ford, meanwhile, was having a lot more trouble with McGucket's wand than he'd had with Stan's. He tried to start with a _wingardium leviosa_ but his quill barely even fluttered. He switched to _lumos_ and at least got a light right off the bat, but it was pitifully dull. He began shaking the wand in frustration, trying to force a brighter light.

" _Hey_ , not so rough now, Stanford," said McGucket, "I still gotta use that thing when you're done with it, y'know."

Stan and Penelope were now _both_ helplessly lost in muted giggle fits.

"I…" Ford stared at the sickly yellow light at the end of McGucket's wand. Turning a glare on his brother, he snapped, "Shut up, Stanley!"

"What did _I_ do?" Stan wheezed, wiping at his watering eyes.

"Hey, Pen, you alright?" McGucket touched his housemate's shaking shoulder tentatively. Her giggle-snorts had breached "breathing difficulties" territory.

" _What_ is going on over here?" Professor Glass had returned to their side of the room and now loomed over the pair of desks.

"Nothing!" Penelope squeaked, face red.

" _Knox,_ " Ford whispered, clearly hoping to put out his pathetic attempt at _lumos_ before the professor noticed.

"I'm sure," said Glass. He turned his attention to Stan. "Well, Mister Pines?"

"Well what? … Sir."

"Have you had as much luck with Miss Carvel's wand as you did with your brother's?"

"Um."

"You haven't even tried yet."

"No sir."

" _Well?_ "

Staring hard at the wand in his hand, Stan adjusted his grip, tried to get comfortable with it. It was a lot longer than he was used to. He could feel Professor Glass glaring at him, along with what felt like the entire class. He tried to ignore it. This should still be easy, right? It was such an easy spell…

"Uh, _lumos_ ," he muttered, ears burning. Penelope's wand flickered for a split second but then went dark. The thing still felt awkward and unwieldy in his hand, and getting even that little flicker had felt _weird_. Like trying to draw a picture with your eyes closed, or write left-handed.

"That's what I thought," said Glass, shaking his head, "Well, Stanley, now you know that when the day comes where you need to borrow a wand, your brother is the first one you'll want to ask. I'd suggest keeping him close at hand."

"Yes sir," Stan muttered, wanting Glass to move on already. How come _he_ had to get all the attention when Ford could barely get McGucket's wand to work either? Whatever. It didn't matter. He _was_ gonna keep his brother "close at hand" in the years to come, long after the two of them were finished with this stupid school. Let Glass do his snide "Mister Pines" bit. In just a few more years he'd still be stuck here teaching snobby little Slytherins how to handle each other's wands, and Stan and Ford would be long gone.

They had it all planned out, what they'd do once they graduated. First they'd have to tell one last lie to their parents. Thanks to American wizard laws they wouldn't really be allowed to talk to them—much less live with them—anymore once they were adults. They'd tossed around the idea of doing something drastic like faking their deaths or getting a government obliviator to take care of it, but ultimately decided to keep it simple: A letter saying there was some job or school in England they'd both gotten into, an unkept promise to come back to America to visit whenever they scraped enough money together. They knew their parents. Sure, they'd be put out about not getting to see them anymore, but they'd also be proud, and having two fewer mouths to feed wouldn't hurt.

Once they got that out of the way, they _would_ go back to America, but not to New Jersey. They were gonna head out west and look for all the legendary magical creatures witches and wizards had hunted for centuries, like the Sasquatch: So obvious even a no-maj could spot one, yet somehow still so elusive no one had ever caught one. Or the Thunderbird: So rare no one had seen one alive since Scamander's day. Or the American Unicorn: Legend had it that unlike the European Unicorn it could _talk_ , but many said legend was all it was. For years Ford had been obsessed with the kind of creatures even wizards found weird. A few times he and Stan had even snuck into the Forbidden Forest to see if they could find any of the unicorns or centaurs or hippogriffs supposedly living there.

Stan didn't nerd out over their post-graduation hunting plan quite the same way Ford did, but it still made him happy to think about it on days like this. If they really did find a Thunderbird or whatever they'd be the most famous wizards in the whole world, with more money and babes than you could shake a stick at. And if they didn't, well, he could think of worse ways to spend the rest of his days than chasing down unicorns in the woods with Ford.


	3. Priori Incantatem

It was their last day at Hogwarts, and Stan had no idea where Ford was.

The train was leaving in just a few hours—they'd already started letting kids on to stow their luggage—and he hadn't seen him all morning. Heck, he hadn't seen him since yesterday afternoon, when they wrapped up the last of their packing. Ford's luggage was still sitting on his bed, exactly where it'd been when Stan went to sleep last night. Ford liked to sneak up to the Astronomy Tower late at night sometimes; Stan had figured he was taking advantage of his last chance to do it. But before today Ford had always gotten back by morning…

Stan checked the Astronomy tower, but it was empty. He tried the Great Hall next, hoping Ford would come back from wherever he was to get some breakfast, but no dice.

On the last day of school, kids tended to filter in and out of the sparsely-populated Great Hall until the train left, milling about aimlessly or saying their goodbyes. Stan was trying to figure out where to look for Ford next when he spotted a familiar face sitting alone at the Ravenclaw table, sipping on a mug of coffee and reading a potions textbook.

"McGucket!" Stan ran over to the table and landed in the chair across from him.

"Hm?" McGucket looked up from his book. Geeze, _studying_ on the last day of school. Only McGucket. "Oh, hey Stanley."

"Have you seen Ford?"

"Not since yesterday," he said with a shrug, "Reckon he's still practicin.'"

"Practicing what?"

McGucket frowned.

"He didn't tell you?"

He didn't, so McGucket did: A few days ago, Ford had been approached by a headhunter from the Ministry of Magic about trying out for a job in the Department of Mysteries. There was some kind of test they could give him right here at Hogwarts before the train left, and if he passed he could wind up conducting research in the same place where they built time-turners, where they kept prophecies, where magical experiments outsiders couldn't begin to dream of took place every day…

"…y'know they call the folks that work there Unspeakables," McGucket told him, "'cause they ain't allowed to talk about what they get up to in there."

"Whoa…"

"Anyway, I think he's been practicin' for the test somewhere down in the dungeons; you know how y'all got a bunch of abandoned classrooms down there."

"Right. Uh, thanks, McGucket." Stan got up to leave.

"No problem. And sorry."

"For what?"

"I thought he woulda told you before he told me…" McGucket fidgeted with the pages of his book uncomfortably.

"Yeah, whatever, it's fine."

Stan would've thought so too. Of course, that was nothing _McGucket_ needed to apologize for…

It didn't take him long to find Ford once he started poking his head in abandoned classrooms downstairs. It wasn't exactly hard to tell once he hit the right one, after all:

The cool, dimly-lit classroom was… _swarming_ with shiny white teacups. A few of them sat on the floor, but most of them floated in the air, languidly spinning and drifting in circles like sleepy fish in an aquarium.

Ford leaned against the wall opposite the door, wand in hand, guiding one of the teacups from the floor into the air. He looked rough around the edges: Sweaty, dark circles under his eyes, hair mussed and greasy. He must've been here all night. His face was intently focused. Had he even noticed Stan come in?

"Hey, Ford."

Ford jumped and the teacup he'd been lifting clattered to the stone floor, cracked but miraculously unbroken.

"Oh, Stanley. Didn't see you there."

"McGucket told me about your test today."

Instead of responding, Ford frowned and muttered a spell under his breath, lifting the fallen teacup into the air once more.

"So what's all this? Havin' a tea party?"

"I needed to brush up on transfiguration."

"Huh? Oh…" Maybe it was kind of stupid, but that made Stan uneasy, the thought that every last one of the teacups floating through the air used to be… something else. Stones? Rats? Spider webs? Could be anything: Ford was good at transfiguration, and these dungeons were creepy.

"So," said Stan, ducking around floating cups in an attempt to find a clear path to Ford, "You been down here all night? You didn't think it might help to get some _sleep_ before the test too?"

"I've got something for that," said Ford, nodding down at a couple of empty potion bottles sitting at his feet.

"That's healthy," Stan muttered, rolling his eyes. The flock of teacups was getting too thick to navigate without displacing any, and Stan didn't wanna touch them. He could talk to Ford from here.

"So when were you gonna tell me?"

"Hm?" The cracked cup was securely hanging in a patch of air to the left of Stan's shoulder now, and Ford was directing another one from the floor to join it.

Stan's fists clenched, but he tried to make himself calm down. Ford was stressed, and had already been up all night. He wasn't gonna be great at conversation right now.

"I found out about your test from _McGucket_ ," Stan said, "When were you gonna tell _me?_ "

"Oh."

Ford finally looked away from the teacup and up at Stan. The cup, meanwhile, halted its journey through the air. After a couple of seconds of silence, Stan noticed they _all_ had: Where before the cups had floated, drifted, and bobbed like apples in a bucket of water, now each and every one of them hung dead still in the air.

"I'm sorry," said Ford, "I've only known a couple of days myself. I only told Fiddleford yesterday."

"That… doesn't answer my question."

"You have to understand, they told me the test wouldn't take long. An hour at most. And I'd know immediately if I passed or failed. And _very_ few people pass and usually they don't even _let_ someone as young as me take it. Statistically speaking, the most likely outcome here is I _will_ fail and just get on the Hogwarts Express afterwards, like it didn't happen at all."

"…you _weren't_ gonna tell me. Not unless you passed." Stan's heart was suddenly pounding. "I mean, you _were_ gonna tell me if you passed, right? Or was I just gonna sit on the train waitin' for you until it pulled out and never see you again? Was _that_ the plan?"

"No! Of course not! I…"

The teacups were on the move again, tracing slow circles in the air as if Stan were standing in the eye of a very lazy hurricane.

"What the heck, Stanford?"

"I was going to tell you! I was! It's just, I was worried and I needed to get some practice in and there wasn't enough time…"

"You had enough time to tell McGucket."

"That's different," Ford muttered, twitching his wand and bringing the teacup cloud to a halt once more.

"What's _that_ supposed to mean?"

" _Look_ , Stanley," said Ford, brandishing his wand at the cups nearest him, "Can we have this talk after the test? I don't have much time left to practice."

"You're joking."

" _Confringo!_ " One of the teacups in the air exploded in a little ball of fire, making Stan flinch. Then Ford silently flicked his wand a couple times and two more cups followed suit. Their explosions were less impressive, but, even so, Stan couldn't repress a twinge of jealousy. Non-verbal casting was something he'd never been able to get the hang of, but Ford made it look _easy_.

"For—"

" _Confringo!_ " Flick. Flick. Flick. " _Confringo!_ " More teacups fell victim to Ford's attacks. The air smelled of smoke and dust, and powdery ceramic detritus covered the floor.

"Ford, will ya put the wand down for ten seconds and _talk_ to me?"

"But I need to practice…" He flicked his wand and yet another teacup exploded, this one close enough that some of the ceramic shrapnel hit Stan.

" _Ford_."

Flick. Flick. His brother seemed determined to ignore him now. Teacups exploded closer and closer to Stan. At this rate one was gonna blow up right in his face.

"Alright, that does it…" Stan muttered, pulling out his own wand.

" _Confringo!_ "

" _Expelliarmus!_ "

There was a flash of orange light bright enough to make Stan's eyes water and a noise like a giant tuning fork. Next thing Stan knew his wand was vibrating in his hand so hard his whole arm buzzed with it, like he'd grabbed a downed power line. He yelped and tried to let go, but his fingers refused to unclench. He looked to Ford and saw him shaking his own wand; he couldn't drop it either. That was when Stan finally noticed the thread of vibrant gold light connecting the end of his wand to the end of Ford's. It seemed to be the source of the thrumming vibrations jolting through his wand: It was emitting a low hum that muffled all other noise. Ford's teacups crashed one by one to the floor, like raindrops at the start of a storm, and even though Stan saw each one shatter, he had to strain his ears to hear them, like they were in another room.

"What's happening?" Stan shouted to Ford, and his voice rang uncomfortably loud in his ears. He wasn't muted like the teacups. If anything, he was louder.

" _Priori incantatem…_ " Ford murmured. Stan heard him perfectly. Ford had stopped trying to release his wand and now simply marveled at the thread of light.

"Wh-what?" Stan had _no_ idea what to make of all this, and Ford's nerd words weren't helping. He tried to pull his wand away from the light-string, but the thread remained unbroken. Heck, it pulled _back_.

"I've read about this," said Ford. He sounded excited—the way he got when he tried a new spell for the first time—but he also sounded scared.

"So what the heck is it?"

"It's something that can only happen when wands with twin cores duel."

"Oh for—I wasn't trying to start a _duel_ , I just wanted you to _talk_ to me."

Ford looked up from the light-string to frown at him.

"I _said_ I was sorry, Stanley." He sure didn't sound sorry. "But frankly, can you blame me for putting off this conversation? If I don't pass the test, then you'll just have gotten mad at me over nothing."

"I'm not _mad_ at you…" That was a lie. Stan couldn't remember the last time he got this mad at Ford. He didn't want to be. The way McGucket told it, if Ford passed this test it'd be the best thing that ever happened to him. So it'd make him a real jerk if he rooted against it, right? But it wasn't fair. Everything was gonna change and Ford didn't even wanna talk to him about it, like all of a sudden he needed to keep secrets from him, the way they'd kept everything from their parents. For _years_ he and Ford had been planning this day, and this wasn't how it was supposed to go…

"Stanley."

"What."

"Look _._ "

A couple of beads of light had formed on the thread between their wands, and they were all drifting in Ford's direction. They were going pretty slow, but there was something ominous about the way they moved.

"What the heck's going on _now?_ "

"Listen," said Ford, " _Priori incantatem_ can force a wand to regurgitate spells it recently cast."

"Regurgitate?"

"We should try to get it to hit your wand," said Ford, gesturing at the beads, " _Expelliarmus_ is a relatively harmless spell; the regurgitation would probably just knock your wand from your hand."

"And then maybe this will stop. Okay." Stan stared at the beads. They kept heading for Ford. Stan tried wiggling his wand, tilting it to encourage the beads to slide back toward him. No change.

"Uh, how do I make them stop?"

"I don't know!" Ford yanked his own wand upward. His string-tilting had no more effect than Stan's. "Are you _trying_ to stop them?"

"Of course I'm tryin'!" Wait, were the beads moving _faster_ now?

"Then what the heck is _that?!_ " Ford flailed his non-wand hand at the string to indicate the beads' acceleration. At his cry, however, the beads paused in their journey, wavering like they were thinking about heading back toward Stan.

"See? Told ya I was tryin.' What the heck else would I be doin'?"

The beads resumed their journey to Ford.

"Well _clearly_ you need to try harder!"

Back to Stan.

"What, you think I did that on purpose?"

To Ford.

"It doesn't exactly _look_ like an accident."

To Stan.

"What's _that_ supposed to mean?"

To Ford.

"You can't stand the thought of me passing that test, can you? You've obviously been mad at me from the moment you got here."

"I'm mad at you because you didn't tell me!"

"You're mad because you don't want to hunt Thunderbirds by yourself."

"Don't tell me how I feel!" Stan snapped. Ford wasn't completely wrong, but that wasn't the point here. "I'm not tryin' to mess up your stupid test!"

"Then what do you call _this?_ "

The beads may have switched directions several times during the argument, but they'd still made progress toward Ford's wand. The bead closest to him was scant inches from the tip.

"I…" This was getting serious. Stan tried tilting his wand again, but the bead kept sliding toward Ford's wand. Slowly, slowly…

"Admit it!" cried Ford, holding his wand at arms' length, "You're not even trying!"

"Yes I _am!_ "

 _Boom!_

The blast was small, but still a lot bigger than the little pops that took out the teacups. They both stumbled backward from it, barely keeping their feet.

"Ford," Stan said with a cough, "Are you alright?"

"Ngh."

Stan gasped when he looked up to see his brother's condition.

The palm of Ford's right hand was black and charred and ragged, like a rose of ash had bloomed there. All six fingers were a vicious red, mottled with pale yellow where blisters the size of grapes had formed. The air smelled kinda like burnt bacon. Ford had his ruined hand cradled in his good one and just stood there staring at it, like he couldn't figure out what it was.

"Y-you can fix that, right?" Stan asked breathlessly, "You know healing magic."

Later—a lot later—he realized that was a stupid thing to say. He should've dragged Ford to the hospital wing first thing. It was a reflex, though. For the past seven years, any time he needed any kind of tricky spell done, anything he couldn't do himself, he'd ask Ford. He hadn't failed him once.

"Yes, ah, y-yes I think I…" Ford's voice was tight and watery with pain. His eyes turned from his hand to the floor, searching for…

"My wand!"

Stan's eyes followed Ford's to the floor and he saw it.

Well, part of it.

The couple inches of wooden shrapnel on the floor was broken off and burnt at both ends. At one end Stan could see the dragon heartstring core poking out, jagged where it'd split from the rest of the wand. That was bad. Stan didn't know a whole lot about wand repair, but he knew enough to know that when the core broke, it was hopeless. You had to get a new one.

"What did you _do_ to my— _ah!_ " In his anger Ford had clenched his fists, only to give a full-bodied shudder of pain at what that did to his hand.

"Ford!" Stan ran over to his brother, ceramic debris crunching under his feet. When he got to him, though, Ford backed away. He was back to holding his ruined hand in his good one, and now he stood hunched over, protectively curled around it.

"Ford, we can… Here, use mine." Stan stepped forward and shoved his wand into Ford's good hand. Ford blinked at it.

'C'mon!" said Stan, "It-it'll be just like that one time in Glass's class, remember?"

Ford frowned. Stan wished he'd just fix himself up already; seeing his hand all messed up like that had Stan's stomach doing somersaults, and his own hand prickled in sympathy.

At last Ford seemed to snap out of it. He adjusted his grip on Stan's wand, pointed it at his hand, and muttered a complicated incantation Stan didn't recognize, his brow furrowed with concentration. At first it worked perfectly, beautifully, just like Ford's magic always worked: The blisters melted into smooth skin, the red faded back to Ford's natural pallor, and the blacked bits of his palm started to peel back and crumple away, revealing new, pink skin underneath.

Then the new pink skin started peeling back too.

Ford gasped and swore under his breath, interrupting his own incantation. The peeling didn't stop.

"Ford!"

"I-it's fine, I can…" There was a lot of blood now, but Ford flourished Stan's wand at his hand once more and gasped out a different spell. This one put a searing bright light in his palm for a couple seconds, and Stan had to look away. When he looked back the bleeding had stopped, at least.

In the palm of Ford's hand was a scar, a pink-white rippled starburst of stiff-looking skin covering the entire palm.

"It shouldn't have left a scar…" Ford muttered distantly. There were still tears of pain on his cheeks. He looked down at the wand in his hand as if to demand an explanation, then dropped it in disgust.

"A-at least you fixed it, right?" said Stan. He bent to retrieve his wand from the floor.

"If I had _my_ wand I could've…" Ford trailed off, face falling. "The test! Without my wand how will I—"

"Here!" Stan held his wand out to him. "Use mine. Keep it! I'll just get a new one."

"I can't use _your_ wand."

"Sure ya can! They're 'twins,' remember? It, it'll…"

"'It'll be just like Glass's class'? Forget it."

"Come _on_ , Stanford, it'll be fine. You just messed up because your hand hurt too bad. Take it!"

"I said forget it, Stanley! I don't _want_ yours. I'll borrow Fiddleford's."

"What? This is _important_ , man, don't do that."

"Yes, it _is_ important, but that didn't stop your wand from destroying mine, did it?"

"It was an accident, Ford, c'mon."

"An 'accident.' Right."

" _Please_." Stan held his wand out to Ford. It was bad enough already that he had to go and screw up this bad. Why couldn't his brother just let him make it right?

"I said no," said Ford, glaring down at the wand, "Why would I want the wand that just ruined my life?" He turned his glare from the wand to Stan.

"Stanford…"

Ford crossed his arms and turned his back on his brother.

"They'll have started letting people on the train by now," he said coldly, "You should go get yourself a spot."

"Y-yeah, sure… I'll save you a seat?"

"Don't bother. I'll just apparate."

Ford was good at apparating, but not crossing-the-Atlantic good. Stan wondered where he was gonna go.

"I… I hope you pass your test."

Ford didn't reply. Instead he stormed out of the classroom, probably to hunt down McGucket. Stan didn't bother following him. He needed to get a spot on the train anyway, right?

Before leaving the Slytherin dorm for the last time, Stan snuck his wand into Ford's luggage, tucking it safely away in the special compartment where the nerd kept his favorite quills. Even if he failed the test, Ford was going places. He was gonna go on to do _real_ wizard stuff, and someday he might need to do a big spell, something too important to let his own pride get in the way. When that day came, he still wouldn't have his own wand, but at least he'd have the next best thing.


	4. Redeo

When Ford came back through that door—that freaky half-magic-half-electric _hole_ the son of a gun ripped in reality—everything about him was different. He was dressed in a billowing black robe with intricate silver embroidery along the hem, and a matching pointy hat. (" _Finally_ a wizard that actually _looks_ like a real wizard!" Dipper had whispered to Mabel.) He also brandished a long, expensive-looking wand that still had a glossy sheen to it, like it wasn't broken in yet. Stan didn't ask, but Dipper did: Cherry, phoenix feather, custom runes engraved into the handle, and no, Dipper could _not_ try it out, even under Ford's supervision. Stan suspected he relented on that later; as the weeks wore on Ford developed a pretty obvious soft spot for the kid.

Stan had never gotten around to buying a new wand of his own. That wasn't to say he didn't have one, though. He had dozens. For weeks after Ford disappeared he'd found them around the house: Cluttering bookshelves, tucked away in junk drawers, sticking out of grimy coffee mugs in the kitchen sink… He figured his brother must've gone nuts trying to find one that worked as good as his old one, and he figured he never did. Stan kept every one he found. He wasn't sentimental or anything, he'd just gotten enough stern howlers from MACUSA over the years to know that throwing magic trash in a no-maj dumpster again could earn him a visit from the Magic Police or whatever. So instead he tossed all the wands in a milk crate he kept under his bed.

He told himself it was good to have them, in case there was an emergency and he needed to do magic, but deep down he wanted to light the whole crate on fire. He could count on one hand the number of times he'd gotten into that crate over the past thirty years, and each time was like pulling teeth, such a pain he wound up wishing he'd just found a no-maj way to solve the problem. It felt wrong, doing magic with a wand that wasn't yours. Or maybe he'd been away from it so long it felt wrong to do magic at all…

Not that he'd stopped completely. There were things he could do without a wand. Little things, like lighting a campfire with a snap of his fingers or switching the TV on without the remote. Sometimes he'd make the lights flicker while telling tourists the Mystery Shack was haunted. That was plenty. He missed the other stuff sometimes, but not enough.

Dipper and Mabel had asked about it more than once, why he chose to get by with no wand when every other witch and wizard they'd met couldn't live without one. He'd never explained it very well. Mabel kind of seemed to get it, though. Or, at least, it didn't bother her. It bothered Dipper.

But now Dipper had a _real_ wizard to pester about that stuff, didn't he? And now Stan never saw the kid anymore. That made him nervous. He trusted Ford to keep an eye on him and do his best to make sure the kid didn't do something stupid, but he still couldn't help feeling uneasy. After all, when you got down to it, Ford was prone to doing the same kind of "something stupid" Dipper was…

These thoughts idly chased each other through Stan's mind as he rode the elevator down to Ford's basement. Even though he'd specifically told Dipper and Mabel not to play down there, that had to be where he and Ford had gotten to. Stan had checked the entire rest of the Shack for them, so it was either the basement or somewhere outside, and Ford wasn't as interested in wandering into the woods these days as he used to be.

As he neared the lowest level, Stan heard the distant-but-familiar sound of Ford going on about some nerd thing in his explain-y voice, Dipper occasionally butting in with questions. By the time he arrived and stepped out of the elevator, though, the discussion had unraveled into laughter.

Dipper and Ford were sitting on the floor together, Ford waving his wand in the midst of some demonstration, Dipper's eyes alight with fascination. You could practically hear him thinking it: _Finally, a_ real _wizard…_

Something small and shiny flitted through the air, directed by Ford's wand. After squinting at it a minute Stan figured out what it was: A little figure of a wizard on a broom, made out of twists of burnt wire—probably scraps left over from the mechanical component of Ford's freaky door. That didn't sit well in Stan's stomach, breaking off a piece of that thing and making it a _toy_.

The wand in Ford's hand wasn't his fancy new one but a shorter, cheaper-looking one. A spare? Oh geeze, was the guy _still_ looking for the right fit?

Dipper and Ford still hadn't noticed Stan's arrival, too focused on Ford's little show. Stan cleared his throat. Loudly. They both jumped at the noise and then looked up at him sheepishly.

" _Redeo_ ," Ford muttered, and the wire figure zipped straight back to him. He caught it in his hand and crushed it into an amorphous ball. Dipper pouted momentarily, turning to glare at Stan as if he'd _made_ Ford put an end to the fun.

"Dinner's ready," said Stan flatly.

"Not hungry, thanks." Dipper was equally monotone.

"Now Dipper," said Ford gently, "Unless I'm mistaken, you haven't eaten since breakfast."

Dipper didn't answer, but his stomach did: There was an audible growl, and, cheeks reddening, the boy scurried off to the elevator.

"And no more playin' down here!" Stan called after him, for all the good that would do.

Now all of a sudden _Ford_ was the one glaring at Stan. Once Dipper had ridden the elevator out of earshot, he said, "Stanley, I thought we agreed that Dipper could—"

"For Pete's sake," Stan cut him off, rolling his eyes, "I didn't come down to _separate_ you two: Hang out with the kid all you want. But not down here." His eyes flicked over to the empty doorway still crouched in the center of the basement. "It's dangerous."

"It _was_ dangerous," said Ford, "But I've spent weeks dismantling the device now, and I _promise_ the danger is gone."

Stan didn't like the way Ford said "promise." A little too much emphasis, traces of a guilty conscience in his tone. But Ford wouldn't lie about something like that, would he? Well, maybe if it was just their own butts on the line Stan could see it, but lying about this kind of thing would put the kids in danger too. He was sure he could trust Ford not to go _that_ far…

"You know," Ford went on, fidgeting with the ball of wire in his hand, "When you told me the children were behind in their magical education I feared the worst, but he really is quite bright. Both of them are. They've been with you all summer, right?"

"Yeah." Where was he going with this?

"I must say I find it hard to believe they're not caught up yet. I would have thought a couple months' worth of focused magical instruction would be more than enough to—"

"No, Ford," said Stan, rolling his eyes again and crossing his arms, "I haven't been teaching them. That's what you're gettin' at here, right?"

"Naturally."

"Well, I got a business to run here, so I ain't got time to homeschool them. And like you said, they're smart kids anyway. They'll be fine."

"They'll be completely lost! When they _do_ start school they—"

"Oh, give it rest. It's _summer_ and you wanna give them _homework?_ Y'know, there's worse things than not knowing a couple of spells."

"Like giving up magic altogether?"

"How about like getting sucked through a creepy doorway for thirty years?"

"Oh, so that's _my_ fault now?"

" _I_ didn't _build_ the thing, did I?"

"No, _you_ just reawakened it thirty years later despite my _specific instructions not to!_ "

" _You're welcome!_ "

Ford's hands clenched into fists and he nearly punched Stanley in the face again; he was filled with the very same rage he'd felt when the doorway first reopened.

"Hey."

Both men jumped and whirled around at the voice.

Mabel stood outside the open doors of the elevator, chewing on her lower lip and hugging Waddles to her chest. How long had she been there? Had they really been so wrapped up in their argument they didn't hear the elevator come back down?

"Are you guys coming to dinner?" she asked. She smiled her familiar metallic grin, but it looked forced.

"Yeah, of course," Stan muttered, walking over to the elevator, "Comin' right up."

"I'll catch up with you two in a minute," said Ford.

After they left, he looked down at his fists. They were still tightly clenched from arguing with Stan. First he opened his left to reveal the wire figurine he'd smushed beyond recognition. It'd left a couple of angry red creases in his hand, but nothing too painful. Then he opened his other hand and sighed. Splinters. He let the broken pieces of his wand fall to the ground, then began the tedious work of picking wooden slivers from the tough, scarred flesh of his palm.

The wand was nothing to weep over: Cedar, eleven inches, kneazle whisker. A cheap, disposable thing he kept on hand in case one of his better ones broke, which regrettably happened to him more and more over the past few years. Spells tended to backfire on him—often spectacularly—when he'd been using a wand for a while, especially if he was worried about something. One day he'd just suddenly feel an intense, relentless itch in his palm when he picked up his wand—as if the starburst scar there couldn't stand it anymore—and within a few hours something would go wrong and, likely as not, it'd be time to go wand-shopping again. He didn't bother with the whole "the wand chooses the wizard" bit when he got a new one. Any wand can be yours when you're stubborn enough, and wands weren't eager to pick him these days anyway.

After he'd pried the splinters out with his fingernails, he dipped his hand into the pocket of his robe and pressed his palm against the soothing, eerily-cold surface of the small crystal ball he kept there. The ball that contained the rift.

The weight of it in his robe was at once reassuring and stomach-churning. He'd been hyper-aware of it the whole time he'd been talking to Stan. Was it wrong that he still hadn't told his brother about the rift? No, he decided. He could handle this on his own—or perhaps with Dipper's assistance. Telling Stan would do no good. It wasn't like his brother would know what to do about it anyway.


	5. Obliviate

Stan didn't know what to do.

Bill Cypher had trapped him and Ford in some kind of magic-proof cage, and now he was going after the kids. True, if anyone _could_ outsmart Bill it was probably those two, but they were on Bill's turf now, deep within his nightmare-pyramid-thing, and the worst part was the kids weren't even _trying_ to run away. They were trying to fight back. The thought put ice in Stan's blood, threatened to power down his brain.

Ford had already given up: He'd decided to let Bill have what he wanted once he got back, and pray that'd be enough to get him to let the kids go. Part of Stan figured that was the best they were gonna get, but part of him still burned to find another way.

"Are you honestly tellin' me there's nothing else we can do? No way we can take him down?"

"Not out here, there isn't," Ford replied with a heavy sigh, "Bill's only vulnerable in the mindspace. Once we got him there a simple _obliviate_ is all it would take, I'm certain of it, but that spell's not powerful enough to get through this." He ran a hand through his hair, rubbing at his scarred scalp.

"…what if he went into my mind instead? My brain isn't good for anything."

Ford chuckled sadly.

"There's nothing in your mind he wants. It has to be me."

For a long moment, it felt like they were out of options. Then they got the idea.

It was hard to say which one thought of it first; they just looked at each other and immediately knew, without needing to say a word. Ford pulled off one six-fingered glove and held it out to Stan. Stan tried to take it, but Ford didn't let go.

"C'mon, Stanford, we gotta hurry."

"Stanley, listen to me: I'm not talking about a normal, targeted _obliviate_ here. It won't work to remove just one specific memory. If you do this…" He faltered, then forced himself to continue: "You'll lose everything. Understand?"

"Yeah. You're gonna have to take care of the kids for the next few days, okay?"

"I…" Ford's mind reeled as he let go of the glove. Yes. Take care of the kids. As simple as that, and without a second's hesitation. In Stan's place, Ford wasn't sure he'd be so ready so soon. He wasn't sure he'd…

"Of course," Ford said, shaking that thought from his mind, "They'll be fine. I promise."

"Then so will I," said Stan, taking off his fez, "Promise."

They traded clothes quickly, tossing garments at each other and pulling things on without really looking at them, all the while terrified Bill would get back before they could finish. Ford's hands shook and fumbled clumsily as he did up the buttons of Stan's shirt, and Stan had to flap his arms to get them all the way into the billowy sleeves of Ford's robe. Under other circumstances, the image might've been comical.

"Here," said Stan, now fully garbed in Ford's attire. His hand plunged into the right pocket of the robe and pulled out Ford's fancy wand. "I don't have one to loan you, and you should use yours anyway. We can't mess this up."

"Right," said Ford with a grim nod. He reached out to take the wand, but then hesitated at the last second, and it clattered to the floor when Stan let go.

"Wha—"

"Other pocket."

"Okay…" Stan's left hand groped around in the opposite pocket, and he wondered what he'd find there. Something even flashier than the expensive thing on the ground? His fingers closed around a wooden handle and he jumped—for a second there it felt like a lightning bolt was shooting up and down his arm. But in a good way. A _friendly_ lightning bolt made of energy he hadn't felt since…

He pulled the wand out and looked at it, already knowing what he'd see.

"…I thought you threw it away."

"I considered it," Ford confessed, "But I could never bring myself to do it."

"Hey there, old friend…" Stan whispered. He brought his childhood wand to eye-level and twirled the tip in a little circle. It left a pale orange after-image in the air.

"Stanley…"

"I know. Look, pal." His eyes focused on the wand in his hand, as if he really believed it could hear him. "It's time for you to do something _important_ for once in your life, okay? Don't screw it up."

Apparently satisfied his wand got the message, he passed it to Ford, then bent to retrieve Ford's other wand from the floor and slip it back into his pocket.

"I guess that should do it…" Ford murmured, stuffing Stan's old wand up his sleeve so Bill wouldn't spot it. "Oh!"

"What?"

Ford took off his glasses and held them out to Stan.

"Oh, right." Stan snatched his own from his face and traded Ford.

" _Geeze_ , you're blind…" he muttered once he got Ford's on, blinking at his new, nauseatingly-blurred view of the world. His gut clenched. "How well do you need to see to…?"

"Just well enough to point it at you," said Ford, nervously adjusting Stan's rims, "It's all in the wrist, really. You're just a big blur now, but…"

His voice caught in his throat and he struggled to clear it. Out of the corner of his eye he thought he saw a dark shadow approaching. Was Bill back already?

"…but I think, if anything, that'll make it easier."

Stan nodded. Then the shadow loomed large and fell over them.

Perhaps it did make it easier, pointing the wand at a face he couldn't make out, but it was still the hardest spell he'd ever cast.

He cast it perfectly.


	6. Praecantatio Instaurativus

Walking out of the woods with his brain-wiped brother was the hardest thing Ford had ever had to do, and he couldn't begin to imagine the devastation Dipper and Mabel felt. Especially Mabel. Something unexpected happened once they emerged from the woods, though: They encountered an old friend.

McGucket had spent the past month or so developing a method to reverse an _obliviate_ —mostly in the hope of putting his own head back in order—and now he'd spent the last several days perfecting the process on Stan. It was remarkable; with only a few hours' work he'd been able to recall the entire summer—to Dipper and Mabel's delight—and the rest of his history came back to him in leaps and bounds every day. Perhaps there was still a gap or two somewhere in there, but by all appearances he'd now made a full recovery.

Stan was pretty sure he hadn't gotten it _all_ back yet, but he remembered all the important stuff: Fishing with Mabel and Dipper, scamming Mystery Shack customers with Soos and Wendy, lazy afternoon "quidditch" practice sessions with Ford and McGucket… (Really they'd just toss a quaffle around for a while, and eventually devolve into Stan doing trick shots while Ford and McGucket tried to magic the ancient school brooms into flying faster.)

Getting this summer back had been the biggest relief. Sure, he was glad he and McGucket had kept going, but part of him suspected he'd be just as happy now if they'd stopped after that and just focused on making the last days of summer count instead. It was fine, though. He'd still found time for Mabel and Dipper's birthday party. To drill Soos on how to run the Mystery Shack. To pack his bags for his trip with Ford.

For the past couple days it'd been just the two of them around the Shack, packing and double-checking enchanted maps and going over plans that had them both so keyed up they barely remembered to eat. It felt almost like their early years at Hogwarts all over again, back when it was just him and Ford all the time, and that was just fine with them.

Right now, though, Stan wasn't sure where Ford had gotten to; he hadn't seen him all afternoon. It was almost sunset and he'd just wrapped up taking inventory in the gift shop for the last time. Realizing he hadn't had dinner yet, he headed into the kitchen for a snack, and that's where he found his brother.

Ford was hunched over the kitchen table, working at a piece of wood with a whittling knife. That raised Stan's eyebrows. He'd never known Ford to use any kind of no-maj tool so long as he had his wand handy. Heck, Stan had even had to buy his own toolbox before trying to repair the electronic and mechanical components of Ford's freaky magic portal, which meant the guy must've gone _out of his way_ to never touch a screwdriver or soldering gun when he built the thing.

He struggled with the knife now, taking it slow, probably trying hard as he could to avoid adding to the small collection of scrapes and nicks his hands had already picked up. Stan couldn't help but shake his head. Whatever Ford was up to, he should probably step in before his brother managed to take himself from Sixer to Fiver.

"Hey, Ford. Wha'cha up to?"

" _All_ the books say it _has_ to be done by hand…" Ford muttered petulantly. He offered no further explanation.

"Thanks for clearing that up…" Stan muttered. He stepped into the kitchen for a closer look at Ford's makeshift workbench. On the kitchen table there were a couple of spellbooks and several thick branches, each a little different, and each labeled in Ford's tidy, slanted script: _Walnut, Oak, Pine, Cypress…_

" _So_ , what's all this stuff?" Stan asked, a little more forcefully.

Ford paused his whittling to blink at Stan as if he'd just noticed he was there. Then, looking back down at the wood in his hands, he explained:

"Well, this is the first opportunity I've gotten to actually sit down and _try_ it, but I've been doing a great deal of reading about the art of wand-making these past few years…"

"Nerd," said Stan amicably. He fished a Tupperware container of leftovers out of the fridge, grabbed a fork, and plopped down at the table. "So you gonna try to whip something up for me?"

Ford looked up from his work again with a frown.

"I was going to 'whip something up' for _me_. You should have your old wand back."

"Eh," said Stan with a shrug, "I'm sure it likes you better by now anyway—"

"I sincerely doubt it."

"—and it's not like I'd even know what do with it. You know I've barely touched one since Hogwarts."

"You'll need to get back in practice, then," said Ford, smiling as his gaze returned to his work, "I won't be able to untangle those anomalies all by myself, you know."

"Fair enough," said Stan, picking up one of the sticks and a spare whittling knife, "Want some help with this too?"

"Please."

The whittling and sanding of the wood swathes was satisfying work: Difficult enough to not get boring, but also easy enough that he could talk to Ford. The conversation meandered from topic to topic: What the Mystery Shack would be like under Soos's management, news Ford had missed in the last thirty years (though Stan suspected _he_ was still missing a fair chunk of that himself), memories of Hogwarts that were just returning to Stan's mind…

"So what are you gonna do with all these?" said Stan, dropping his latest sanded stick on top of the pile of wand-shaped sticks they'd collected, "You're just makin' the one wand, right?"

"Apparently core insertion is quite the finicky process. The wood _has_ to be the right shape first, and even then the core may refuse to enter it, or the wood could split in the midst of the insertion spell. Most books advise assembling _at least_ ten wooden bases before even _beginning_ to prepare the core."

The pile they'd assembled had twenty.

"Huh. What kind of core are you gonna use?"

"Unicorn hair. Mabel collected so much for the protection spell there was some left over afterward."

"Enough for a whole wand, huh?"

"More than enough, actually."

Stan smiled slyly.

"How _much_ more?"

"What do you mean?"

"Think you got enough to make two?"

It was past midnight by the time Ford finally got the insertion spell to take twice—the process was every bit as tricky as he'd described—but they weren't tired. They were so intent on the project they hadn't even noticed the sun going down hours ago, or the fact they'd been working by the light of a single elderly lamp in the kitchen. From the outside the Mystery Shack looked haunted: All its windows dark save for one wavery light. But then, suddenly, in the dead of night, from that one lone window shone a sunset glow.


End file.
